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According to CNN, Gorsuch was answering a question from Nebraska Republican Ben Sasse about why the Declaration was so important. He talked about how John Hancock had signed his name so “big and boldly” as a sort of flaunting of the fact that he might have been signing his death warrant.

Only, he didn’t say “big and boldly” at first.

“That’s why John Hancock is now synonymous with his signature. No one remembers who John Hancock was, but they know that that’s his signature because he wrote his name so bigly — big and boldly,” Gorsuch said, accidentally using what sounded like a word President Donald Trump’s critics have accused him of using.

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“You just said, ‘bigly,'” Sasse, a frequent Trump critic from the right, responded. Gorsuch closed his eyes and laughed at himself.

“Bigly,” of course, is what it sometimes sounds like when Trump pronounces the words “big league,” one of his favorite phrases. (At least, that’s what he claims he’s saying.)

It’s certainly funny to see that Judge Gorsuch is also willing to embrace the accidental neologism, albeit accidentally. However, after three days of testimony that included his own heartfelt statements as well as a lot of meticulously planned faux outrage from pontificating Senate Democrats — like Sen. Stuart Smalley of Minnesota — one can imagine he was bigly tired of political posturing.

And, hey — he got a lot more laughs than any of Al Franken’s movies ever did.